gold extra & SZENE Salzburg present:

Absurd Realities

13.-17.September 2022 at Szene Salzburg

5 Days - 1 Documentary Escape Experience - 2 Exhibitions - 11 absurd/documentary Games - 2 Talks/Presentations

Link to Szene Salzburg and TICKETS BORDER GRID

How absurd ist reality? More absurd than being afraid of freezing because you ignored the climate crisis? More absurd than a dance move that saves you from deportation? More absurd than a horrible date with a duck? A concentrated load of absurd realities awaits you mid-September, in the form of the revival of the documentary "Escape Experience" BORDER GRID, and in two game exhibitions BRIEFS and THE 5TH COMMANDMENT.

BORDER GRID pushes the Escape Room to its limit: the audience accompanies several people on their journey, makes decisions with them and crosses borders together; in space, time and in the mind. The interactively conceptualised puzzle and experience space is formed from the life stories and thoughts of interview partners, which Tobias Hammerle (gold extra) met in Mexico, Chile, Israel and the UK. The performance takes place in a space whose walls consist of high-resolution video walls which allows them to change dynamically and to transform with the story and interactions. The title BORDER GRID holds the impetus and artistic vision for the interactive project: what if the borders that surround us, the conventions, rules, national borders, could not be dividing lines but connections?

BORDER GRID - Performances: 13.9 - 15.9, each day at 18:30 and 20:30 16.9 - 17.9, each day at 16:00 and 18:00

BRIEFS is an annual series of micro-games presented in physical reality for the first time at SZENE Salzburg. Out of over 50 submissions from all over the world, Evgeni Puzankov and Georg Hobmeier (gold extra) curated 5 projects, whose developers will participate and give more insights in a talk. On display will be a series of fantastically absurd games that are short enough to illuminate your evening and profound enough to consume your weekend.

Interactive Exhibitions BRIEFS: Dates here!

THE 5TH COMMANDMENT series is a cycle of short games that addresses the nature of war and killing. This is done by using different forms of games that look at wars from various angles. THE FALLEN, the first game in the series, shows the war that has been going on in eastern Ukraine since 2014 in the thematic framework of a first-person shooter. GATES OF ALEPPO was created with the Syrian musician Wolfswift and paints a bleak picture of everyday life in besieged Aleppo. Also on show are guest contributions by Victor Morales, whose machinima looks into the threatening future of drone warfare and [anonymous russian artist], who deals with Russia`s wars of extermination.